There’s a total solar eclipse happening on August 21, 2017, and for the first time in nearly a hundred years, the Moon’s unabashed Sun-blocking power will be visible from much of the continental U.S. (though certain locations will of course have a better vantage point than others). Warning: don’t look directly at it with your naked eyes—instead, use certified eclipse glasses or the pinhole method described here.
In the U.S., the eclipse will appear to move across the country from West to East, with the best view starting around 9:05 a.m. PDT in Lincoln Beach, Oregon, according to NASA, and moving southeast throughout the day to end around Charleston, South Carolina at 2:48 p.m EDT (enter your location here to find what time to look up).
But what if you are stuck in work that whole time, or something else is keeping you inside? Don’t worry, the internet has your back.
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Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
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